Home is Where the Axe Falls
by Brbmagicmissle
Summary: Hroda didn't intend on being welcomed home by the tip of a sword... Well, not by the Legion. And not so soon. Back for the first time in fourteen years, the young woman must come to terms with destiny and face an enemy she had not seen since childhood. RR


Well, this is rather short. Other chapters will be a bit lengthier but right now, just trying to get a feel across.

Yes, there is supposed to be a kind of cliffhanger.

Prologue, _huzzah_!

Please read, review, let me know your thoughts!

Hroda Bear-Mauler, my dovahkiin, and her humble beginnings. :)

- Brbmagicmissle 3

* * *

><p><strong>Home is Where the Axe Falls<strong>

Mid-winter, 4E 177

-Two years after the signing of the White-Gold Concordat-

Three miles outside Windhelm.

* * *

><p>The chill was horrid this time of year. Frost and wind seemed to seep in through every crack and floorboard of the longhouse, making living there increasingly uncomfortable, even for a family of Nords. Even though the patriarch of the house, Berud Bear-Mauler, had spent the autumn and most of early winter going through and patching every crack he could find in the house's walls with tar, the wind still seemed to find its way inside, much to his dismay.<p>

Sitting at a small table in the corner of his home watching smoke waft up from the hog cooking in the fire pit, the man nursed a mug of mead. He looked very much like he had given up his futile fight with the elements, choosing instead to brawl with the kegs of honey-mead from down in the cellar while the children were out tending the cows and chickens. Berud wouldn't be bothered with them right now. The man was simply too exhausted.

Aside from patching the house, Berud Bear-Mauler had only two duties; operating his small farm and caring for a newborn girl, swaddled and sleeping in his bed nearby. Rubbing a grizzled hand over his weary face, the man sighed and scratched at his rugged, untrimmed red beard for a moment before turning back to his swill. His demeanor made him seem more like a hunched old man rather than the forty-something farmer that he was. Instead, the man looked ...bedraggled at best, world-weary and miserable at worst. The roaring of the wind was beginning to drive him mad, though surely the roaring of his children would only hasten his ascent to Sheogorath's realm. On that note, he was happy at least that it was just he and the girl-child inside at the moment. Then again, if his mind were to become daedra puddy, would he really object? Scoffing into his drink, the man took a half-lidded glance around his home. Everything seemed so still, aside from the stray flecks of snow that found their way inside, their dance decorating the room with white specks and reminding him of just how vain his efforts had been to protect his home from the bitter cold. At least the fire pit kept things bearable.

The longhouse was simply one long room separated into different spaces by screens of stretched and tanned horker-skin. At the center of the room was a crackling firepit, a cooking sow hanging on its spit, the flesh cracking as the meat expanded. Tables and desks lined the walls of the house, their surfaces covered in farming utensils and baskets of potatoes and other hardy foods that would get his clan through the winter. Along with a modest bookcase that was rarely touched anymore, an area was cut off at the furthest end of the house, it's floors covered with old blankets and hay for when the boys had to bring in the animals due to the frigid snows. Two beds lined the wall nearest Berud, some feet away from the cellar door; one large bed for Berud's four boys, the other for himself... and formerly, his wife, Hroja. The house seemed so much emptier now, even though five other people still lived within its walls.

_Hroja_...

Berud closed his eyes for a long while and rest the cusp of his mug against his lower lip. The man slumped against the table with arms folded over the surface, his fingers tracing circles over pewter mug as he stared its the murky. He blamed himself, of course. For what had happened to Hroja. Fate, his eldest boy, Brandr, had called it. Unavoidable. He had nearly beaten the young Stormcloak to the ground for that comment; instead he broke a few of his teeth. The both of them made up almost immediately, the shock of loosing wife and mother bringing them together in comforting embraces while the younger children waited outside in the yard, unbeknownst to the fate of their mother.

A whimper from nearby caused the man to perk up through his sad stupor and Berud turned his eyes toward the little bundle kicking away on his bed. Hroda, he had named the child, hoping that the closeness of that name to his wife's own would offer her some kind of blessing. As of late though, it seemed as if there was no blessings to be seen in his house. Hroda was born almost a month ahead of schedule, and with her coming into this world, it signaled the departure of his beloved wife.

_Hemorrage_, the mid-wife has said when she finally arrived at the Bear-Mauler's threshold. His wife had been too far gone by then, no amount of healing the woman could conjure up could save her. _This day, she goes to Sovngard._Berud and Hroja had delivered their fourth child by themselves, no mid-wife or healer present. That time it wasn't something they had planned on doing, but the snows had fallen particularly hard that winter, barring off roads to and from Windhelm and making what navigable paths there were very dangerous to travel. After little Sigvaar though, they had both assumed that they could handle another birth on their own. Five years later, Berud found himself standing with his four sons and infant daughter, drunk as a fish, grimacing and gritting his teeth through the prayers of Windhelm's Priest of Arkay as she laid his wife to rest with the moldy, forlorn bones of her covetous forbearers.

As though the day couldn't have been worse, the elder Bear-Mauler found himself in a scrap with another mourner by the name Odros Romathran, a Dunmer fresh from the tombs, not long after his Hroja's funeral ceremony. He would later discover that the cremation he drunkenly interrupted and professed as "profane" was for the family's stillborn son. Brandr pointed out the irony once out of earshot of Odros, earning the young man a swat from his enraged father while the Windhelm guard escorted Berud and his clan to the city gates.

A shrill wailing brought the man from his recollections and he rose to his feet, quickly, though unsteadily, crossing the few feet from his seat to his bed. Scooping up the girl, Berud held her to his chest, rocking the infant too and fro. She was sickly. Since his wife's recent death, he'd been giving the child cow's milk to pacify her. It kept her alive, but the farmer feared that by spring it'd just be himself and his sons left in this hovel.

"Da!"

The quick burst of chill shook the grizzled man and he snarled, turning his back to the door to protect the fragile bundle in his arms. He turned an irritated eye toward his second-born as he bound toward him after kicking the door closed, the boy's cheeks crimson with cold.

"Wha' is it, Hjolding? Shouldn' you be ou' feedin' the hens?"

Hjolding shook his thick shocks of matted blonde hair, sending dewy drops of melted snow all over his father's tunic. Quickly he backed away a few feet, noticing his father had been drinking a bit, never a good sign of late.

"There'sa grey-skin out fron'," he started tentatively, grinding the heel of his leather boot into the house's sooty turf. "Axle o' his cart done gone out on 'im."

The contemptuous snort his father gave caused the boy to frown a bit. Hearing nothing else after a few moments, he inched a bit closer and placed a hand on the farmer's shoulder, lips tightening into an anxious frown.

"He's gotta wife'n child with'im an' tha snows getting' heavier. Tis' cold, Da."

"No, Hjolding."

"Da!"

"The elf got legs, don' he? Tell 'im to getta steppin'," Berud bellowed, lifting himself from the bed. He towered over the boy, eyeing him dangerously as his son opened his mouth to offer another feeble attempt to get him outside. Luckily, Hroda's sudden cry drew his attention, quelling his irritation somewhat. With a deep sigh, he turned away and walked toward the fire pit, eyeing the cooking sow as a means of distraction.

"Da…"

"Outside wit'ya, child. Leave me to me mead…"


End file.
